Houthi military helicopter flies over the Galaxy Leader cargo ship in the Red Sea in this photo released on Nov. 20, 2023.
Houthi Military Media | Via Reuters
The United States and the United Kingdom have “successfully conducted strikes” against Houthi targets in Yemen, President Joe Biden said late Thursday.
“Today, at my direction, U.S. military forces — together with the United Kingdom and with support from Australia, Bahrain, Canada, and the Netherlands — successfully conducted strikes against a number of targets in Yemen used by Houthi rebels to endanger freedom of navigation in one of the world’s most vital waterways,” Biden said.
The Iran-backed Houthi militia group began their drone and missile attacks on shipping vessels and cargo ships traversing the Red Sea late last year, drawing global condemnation.
The strikes were “in response to continued illegal, dangerous, and destabilizing Houthi attacks against vessels, including commercial shipping, transiting the Red Sea,” according to a joint statement from the governments of Australia, Bahrain, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, New Zealand, Republic of Korea, United Kingdom, and the United States.
Together with Greece, Singapore and Sri Lanka, the nations make up a coalition, Operation Prosperity Guardian, that was launched in December to combat Houthi attacks.
But they did not all participate in the strike: The United States and Great Britain were the only two militaries that carried out the latest strikes. A senior administration official declined to comment on why the rest of the coalition members did not take part.
According to a senior administration official, the Houthis launched about 20 drones and multiple missiles directly against U.S. ships in the Red Sea on Jan. 9. It was the largest attack yet on merchant vessels in the Red Sea and four coalition warships were deployed in response, Pentagon officials told CNBC at that time.
“This attack was defeated by the US and UK naval forces,” the…
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